There’s also a third study starting up with Lena Mamykina, a researcher in Human-Centered Computing at Columbia University, who is working in conjunction with Björn Hartmann, a professor from UC Berkeley:

The success of stackoverflow.com is making all my research community wonder what is it that makes it work so well for the users. Would you be interested in participating in a research study to answer some of these questions? The study would probably involve things like interviews (phone) with your development team, moderators and selected users. The results will be submitted for publication at one of the ACM (Association of Computing and Machinery) conferences (for example a conference on human factors in computing systems, CHI or a conference on computer-supported cooperative work, CSCW). Of course you will have a chance to review and provide your feedback on all the materials before they are published.

We’ll of course be contributing to the interviews, as well as introducing Lena to selected community members who indicate that they are willing to be interviewed for … science!

It’s exciting to be a part of this research, which lets everyone benefit from the slices of time that we’ve all collectively contributed to not just Stack Overflow, but every site in our network. If there’s anything else we can do to help assist any research using the public creative commons data we expose, just contact us.

@Tim – In my experience, you typically don’t get this until after you respond that you would be willing to participate, but before you are actually enrolled in the study. I’ve participated in 2 research studies at my University in the last 6 months and, in each case, I didn’t get the actual disclosure document until I had indicated an initial interest. If you don’t get it before they start asking questions, though, I’d go even further and say that you should contact the human research board at the University. All research involving human subjects has extensive requirements for privacy and risk management and needs to be approved by their HRB and follow their protocols. It would be a serious violation to gather non-public data from individuals without some disclosure about how the data is collected and used and a signed agreement approving that use or a waiver from their HRB.

Since almost two years passed from the original article, I would like to know if there are newer articles on SO, I am doing a phd on professional social networks and I would like to find more about other works and even be able to exchange opinions with others with similar interests. SO is #1 on my list :D